Legolas's Comb
by sylc
Summary: Aragorn's wedding to Arwen is within the hour, but Legolas, much to Gimli's disgust, is not ready.


Beta'd by Neoinean

Dedicated to Rannie and Bone Fauna

Gimli was sitting in an armchair by the empty fireplace, watching Legolas braid his hair. Legolas had finished the back fish plait and was now working a section of hair above his left ear into three sections in readiness for another plait.

"I do not understand it," Gimli said suddenly. He was already dressed, in contrast to Legolas, who had yet to put on his shoes and sash.

Legolas looked fleetingly at him in the dresser mirror before turning his attention back to his hair. "Do not understand what?" he asked calmly.

"Why are you even bothering?"

Legolas frowned. "Bothering with what?" He suddenly scowled and swore under his breath. One of his fingers had missed some strand of hair that Gimli couldn't see. Gimli gave a long-suffering sigh when Legolas began to pull out the plait with his fingers and begin all over again.

The sigh did not go unnoticed by Legolas, who focused his attention on Gimli's reflection. "Gimli? Is something wrong?" His hands still moved on his hair and every now and then Legolas glanced back at his golden tresses to ensure that his plait was forming correctly.

There was a short silence before the gruff response. "We are going to be late."

Legolas winced.

Gimli added, "…and it is your fault."

Legolas sighed. "Gimli, I do not need a lecture."

Gimli scowled, but kept quiet to allow Legolas the silence that he needed to concentrate. As he observed the rapid plaiting pace of his Elven friend's fingers, he fingered his beard, which had been braided already two hours ago into five study plaits bound with silver ties and a fine silver clasp. However, Gimli was not admiring the speed. Instead a mantra had begun chorusing in his head: _He is going to slip, he is going to slip, he is going to slip, he is going to…_

A loud stream of Elvish cursing suddenly disturbed the quiet in the room.

Gimli's brow rose and he stared curiously at Legolas, who was glaring into the mirror at his own reflection. "I have not heard i that /i one before," he said.

Legolas turned quite pink and Gimli laughed at his friend's distress. He would have offered to help Legolas of course, but Legolas was fastidious about his hair and had loudly complained when Gimli had finally gotten him to consent to having his hair braided by him some four months ago. Apparently Gimli's braids had been too fat.

After a pause, Legolas began to redo the plait for the third time and Gimli shifted his attention to stare out of the nearby window. Noon was approaching and his patience was being sorely tried. Now, when the start of Aragorn's wedding to Arwen was precariously close, he suddenly had the overwhelming urge to wrap his fingers around the slender neck of the vain creature sitting in front of him and squeeze.

On turning his gaze back to rest on his friend, he noticed that Legolas had yet again missed a crucial part of his handiwork and was starting again. "This is your fourth attempt you know," he pointed out dryly.

Legolas ignored him and Gimli scowled. He did not like to be ignored by Legolas. Not when Legolas, when trying to gain _his_ attention, would push, scream, and bawl to be noticed. Vain creature!

Gimli sourly asked, "Are you normally this hopeless?"

Legolas blinked. Then he sighed and let go of his hair to bow his head in defeat. His hair unravelled and fell forward to curtain his face in a mass of golden silk. "It is not working is it?" he said in a small voice beneath the curtain.

Gimli folded his arms and smiled. "No."

Legolas sighed again. "What am I going to do?"

"Do not do anything, of course. You look fine." Legolas looked more than fine – he always did, thought Gimli as he said this. At least, Legolas looked good on the outside. Gimli had doubts about the temperament, though.

Legolas lifted his head slightly and, in the looking glass, gave Gimli a weak smile. It did not reach his eyes. "You do not understand," he said. Seeing Gimli's subsequent frown, Legolas continued, "My plaits are a sign of my placing as a warrior. A sign of status."

There was a pause during which Gimli's facial expression only became more bemused. Then there was a gruff, "And…?"

Legolas sighed again and then, his body language reeking of condescension, he swivelled around on his seat and sent Gimli a cold stare. Then he turned back to the mirror and proceeded to glare at his reflection.

Gimli tried a different approach. Perhaps practicality could be stirred in this elf's head. "When you get down there, all you are going to do is watch the wedding, right?"

Legolas nodded. His brow furrowed as he tried to work out where his Dwarvish friend was leading the conversation.

"…and you are going to be standing in a corner and not being the focus of attention."

Legolas nodded again.

"…and thus no one will be watching you."

Legolas frowned.

"And no one will care at all about whether you are wearing your braids or not."

There was a silence during which Legolas's expression became thoughtful as he contemplated Gimli's reasoning. While he did so, Gimli leaned back into his armchair. He was convinced that his point was made and taken.

Then,

"How do you know no one will care?"

Gimli sighed. This was not going well. He got up and stumped over to the open chest at the end of Legolas's guestroom bed. His head disappeared out of sight as he began rummaging through its contents.

"What are you looking for?" Legolas asked. He turned around in his chair to regard Gimli. His head still stuck in the chest, Gimli snorted. His voice was muffled when he replied.

"Looking for your sash. Aragorn supplied you with many of them. Which colour do you want to wear?"

There was a pause during which Legolas furrowed his brow in thought as he tried to remember what colour sashes were actually in the chest. Finally, he asked for the apple green one and Gimli's head reappeared, the respective sash in his hand.

Legolas returned to his hair for another attempt at disciplining the golden locks. Meanwhile, Gimli moved to fasten the sash around his friend's waist.

"I think we must have all gained weight in the past month," he commented as he finished securing the sash around Legolas's waist. He gave the knot a sharp tug.

"That is to be expected, we have had great cause to celebrate," Legolas responded.

Gimli chuckled and moved back to the armchair. "Aye, and thinking of celebrations, perhaps there will be some gain in visiting your blasted forest after all."

"Fangorn or …AI!" Legolas broke off suddenly with a cry of dismay. He pushed back his seat so that he could drop onto hands and knees beneath the table. He seemed to be hunting for something – something that he seemed to be having no success in finding.

"Have you seen my comb?" He turned to look at Gimli.

Gimli shook his head. "What does it look like?"

"It is wood with silver leaves… AI! It was just here! Gimli…" Here, he paused suspiciously. "You have not seen it, have you?"

At Gimli's subsequent shake of the head, Legolas stared at him a while longer, trying to gauge whether his friend was lying. But on seeing nothing but vague amusement in Gimli's face, he rose and sat back on his seat with a pained sigh. He rested his elbows on the dresser top and put his head in his hands.

Silence fell over the room and neither moved for a while. Gimli stared at his friend's back and ran his fingers slowly and thoughtfully through his long beard. As the silence grew, sounds from outside the room began to become more obvious. The sound of the crowd downstairs… _Where we are supposed to be,_ Gimli grumbled to himself. He eased himself out of his chair for the last time that morning and moved across the room to pick up the light shoes that Legolas had yet to put on. Then he turned to return to Legolas's side. Once again, he was struck with irritation at elves in general. _They may be the fairest, most joyful, most sorrowful_, he thought, _but they can also be the most irrational and overemotional creatures on the planet._

"Come," he said now. "Hair or no, the sun is brimming the horizon and I rather think that you would prefer to see your so-called 'grubby' ranger take his wife than to avoid the scene because you have the worst coiffure of all of the attending elves." He slapped the shoes on the table in front of his friend before turning and going over to the door, which he opened to indicate his impending departure. Perhaps the sound of the door opening would spur Legolas into a more rational mood.

But Legolas didn't move.

Gimli sighed. "What is it?" he asked grumpily.

There was no reply. Gimli scowled. "I did not touch your comb," he said. "Maybe you left it in the breast pocket of one of your other tunics."

Legolas turned to gaze glumly at his reflection in the looking glass. "No," he mumbled, sounding pained, "I would not have left it in a different tunic."

"A bag, then? You have quite a number of them." Gimli glanced up at the seven or so embroidered and velvet lined pouches that hung from a hook beside the door.

Legolas sighed. "No."

"You can borrow mine," Gimli offered generously. He jumped in surprise when the sound of tolling bells to summon the wedding guests to the front of the King's House suddenly disturbed the peace. Gimli glanced agitatedly at the corridor outside the room before returning his gaze to his Elvish friend. "Are you coming or not?"

Legolas gave a deeper sigh.

"Legolas?" Gimli's voice held a warning.

Legolas lowered his head and stared gloomily at the surface of the dressing table. He began tracing squiggles across the waxed surface with the index and middle fingers of his right hand.

'Do you want to miss the ceremony?'

"No," Legolas mumbled.

Gimli reached into his front pocket and pulled out his own wooden comb. He strode across the room and held out the item as a peace offering. "Here," he said.

Legolas raised his head and stared sullenly at the offering's reflection in the looking glass.

"Take it," Gimli urged in great irritation. "It will not harm your hair to have it brushed by a dwarf's utensil."

He realised his mistake when Legolas's gaze whipped up to stare at Gimli's thick braids. The blue depths filled with horror. "I can not... I can not end up looking like you," Legolas spluttered.

"You seem to appreciate our smith work well enough," Gimli said, deeply insulted. He took back the comb and tucked it back into his pocket. "The elves have small minds."

"And the dwarves are ugly," Legolas retorted, but the insult didn't hold any bite in it. Legolas's shoulders slumped. "I need an Elvish comb."

"In that case, you could nip across to one of the Lothlórien elves's rooms and borrow one of their combs."

"NO!" Legolas looked horrified. "That would be humiliating!"

"Well, then, you will just have to attend the ceremony with your hair undone and in tangles," Gimli said. He spread his hands. "Which will it be?"

Legolas said nothing, but Gimli could see a considering light in Legolas's eyes.

"Well," Gimli said reasonably, "I expect that all of the Lothlórien elves are already down at the ceremony, so it is not as if your gallivanting around with their combs will be discovered by them."

Legolas glared at him. "And if the case is otherwise and one of them spots me?"

Gimli shrugged. "I am sure that if you show them your split ends they will all be quite sympathetic to your cause and will be falling over themselves to lend you their hair accessories."

Legolas looked vaguely sceptical.

"Of course," Gimli continued, "if that..."

"You can go," Legolas suggested, interrupting him. A sly look had entered his expression. "And then, if you get caught, you can sweet talk your captor like you did the Lady Galadriel to get her to give you three of her hairs."

Lady Galadriel? Ah, that reminded him of something. Gimli beamed at Legolas. "What a good idea," he told Legolas, who looked quite startled. "I will just be a moment."

"Ai, it was a jest, Gim..."

But Gimli had already left the room and trotted across the corridor to enter the rather more expansive guestroom that sat opposite from Legolas's room. Behind him, he heard Legolas's dresser stool scrape across the floor and then the patter of light feet. His Elvish chaser hurried across the corridor to stand just beyond the threshold of this new guestroom. "Gimli!" Legolas hissed. "Get back here!"

"I will just be a moment," Gimli said, glancing smugly back at Legolas's panicked face before turning and wandering over to the dressing table of this strange guest room. He pushed aside the negligee that lay draped over the dresser stool, climbed onto the seat and began rifling through the various drawers.

"Searching for a comb," he muttered under his breath. "Searching for a comb. Gimli calling an Elvish comb."

"Legolas, what are you...? Gimli?"

Gimli turned his head to observe a tall elf clad in the livery of the Lothlórien guard leaning against the doorframe and gazing bemusedly at the pair of them.

"Haldir," Legolas squeaked.

Haldir's gaze slid onto Legolas. "Your hair has come undone," the handsome elf observed dryly. His gaze then turned to Gimli and he grinned good-naturedly. "Had any luck, Master Dwarf?"

"With...?"

Haldir nodded sagely. "Ah, I thought so," he mused. "In Lothlórien, she keeps all her underwear locked up with her jewellery so I imagine she does something similar when she is abroad," he said cheerfully. "You are wasting your time, although I am sure that she would be quite complimented at the thought that you dared to enter her room to..."

"We are not underwear thieves!" Legolas piped up, his face reddening.

"And I am a middle-aged hobbit with hairy feet," Haldir retorted, not bothering to look at the other elf. His gaze slid back to Gimli and the smile returned to his face. "Anyway, you had better get out of here before she thinks something serious is going on and sends the rest of the Lothlórien guard."

Two sheepish looking fellowship members wandered back to Legolas's guestroom. Haldir followed them and when Gimli sat down in the armchair, Haldir perched himself on the arm of the seat. Legolas sat down on the wooden stool.

"Hurry up," Haldir said briskly, looking at Legolas. "You can not attend the ceremony with your hair in that state and you are making Gimli late."

Haldir's curt words seemed to have an effect on Legolas as Legolas obediently bent his head and raised his hands to his head to attempt (again) working his blond locks into plaits.

"So," Haldir said, looking brightly at Gimli. "Your beard looks handsome, especially that clasp."

"Thank you." Gimli's gaze slid back to Legolas and Haldir's gaze followed. Haldir's brow knitted when Legolas undid his half-finished handiwork and began the plait again.

Gimli leaned closer to Haldir. "That is his seventh attempt," Gimli hissed.

Haldir stared at him in astonishment before returning his attention to Legolas. When Legolas slipped again in his handiwork, Haldir stood up, withdrew a comb of wood and pearl from his front pocket, and strode over to Legolas.

"Sit still," Haldir ordered Legolas. Legolas froze and his gaze slid warily towards Haldir.

"What are you going to do?" Legolas queried suspiciously.

"I am going to plait your locks," Haldir said smoothly. He firmly extracted Legolas's fingers from where they were protectively locked over the half-finished plait and began running the teeth of his comb deftly through the tresses. In the looking glass, Gimli saw the eyes of Legolas's reflection shift slowly to observe Haldir's own hairdo. Haldir wore no plaits. Legolas's eyes shifted slowly back to critically observe Haldir's progress with his locks.

"Gimli, could you do the other plait, please," Haldir asked, glancing at him.

"'Wha..." Legolas squeaked.

Gimli stared at Haldir uncertainly. "Yes, but..."

"We are all already very late," Haldir said briskly. "Your help will be much appreciated."

Gimli shrugged and trotted over to begin plaiting the locks on Legolas's other side.

"Haldir, I really do not feel comfortable with Gimli..." Legolas yelped when Haldir, on attempting to reach for one of the ribbons on the dresser top with one hand, tugged on the end of the half-finished plait, which was secured in his other hand.

"Sorry," Haldir apologised. He plucked up a green ribbon and tightly fastened the end of the plait.

Moments later and Gimli had also finished. "Done," they declared.

Legolas turned his head slowly from side to side to cautiously examine the handiwork of dwarf and Lothlórien guard. His eyes widened. Then they began watering like faucets. His face crumpled. "You call... you call these plaits?" he whimpered pitifully. He choked, covered his face with his hands, and began weeping loudly.

Gimli swallowed. Well, admittedly his own plait was rather plump and it sort of bent off to an angle. And Haldir's plait was so thin that split ends were coming out of it at all angles, although that was partly the fault of Legolas's thin hair type.

Haldir pocketed his comb. "Your hair is so dreadfully thin that I wonder how you manage to get sleek plaits at all," he mused. "I suppose you must use a charmed comb."

Charmed... oh. Gimli looked at the weeping elf sitting slumped before them. "He has lost his comb," he revealed to the attentive Haldir.

"What a conundrum!" Haldir said thoughtfully. "Ah, well. I do not know what to do about that, having never had any need to charm my own hair."

At that, Gimli noticed Legolas abruptly quieten and lift his head slightly to gaze into the looking glass and send Haldir's reflection a malevolent and tearful glare.

"Haldir," Gimli hurriedly said, before Haldir could notice Legolas's death-wishing glare and possibly get offended.

"Yes?"

"You are missing the wedding," Gimli said apologetically. "You should go and enjoy the ceremony."

"You can both go," Legolas muttered.

"But..." Gimli began. He looked back at Legolas, but Legolas had hung his head and hidden his expression.

"I will be down in a bit," Legolas said in subdued tone of voice. "You may as well go now. Thank you for waiting for me."

"Then... then I will go," Gimli said gratefully.

"As will I," Haldir said briskly.

Together, guard and dwarf turned and left the room.

As they were descending the steps towards the front of the house, Gimli had the perverse thought that perhaps Legolas had only dismissed them to provoke them to stay out of sympathy. He chuckled. Haldir looked at him curiously.

"It is nothing," Gimli said dismissively. "I was just hoping that Legolas manages to get his hair done."

Haldir smiled. "I am sure that he will find his comb."

They reached the bottom of the landing and there bumped into two more Lothlórien elves, who appeared to be waiting for Haldir. "The ceremony has already begun," the other guards whispered. Their gazes slid to Gimli. "Your beard looks in good condition, Master Dwarf," they praised.

That was the third compliment and it confused Gimli as he had never had his beard complimented by any elves before this day. Then it suddenly struck him that perhaps it was a joke and he glanced down at the beard. But there appeared to be nothing amiss with it. Oh, except that the clasp had slipped a little bit. He reached to straighten it. It did not budge at first, so he wrestled with it a bit.

There was a splintering sound of wood and he looked down at his hand to see, lying in two pieces in his palm, a small wooden comb with silver leaves decorating the spine. The clasp had disappeared from his beard.

Haldir laughed. "I will take it back to him," he said, and he plucked the two pieces out of Gimli's hand, turned, and darted back up the stairs.

"Come," the other elves said to Gimli. "Come, we will escort you to where you may get a discreet view of the ceremony. It is too late to join the crowd." They led him to a nearby window.

Moments after he had looked out a loud wail of anguish rent the noon air and the ceremony proceeding at the front of the house momentarily halted as everyone looked up in surprise and alarm.

Then silence.

The couple standing and holding hands at the front of the house exchanged a bemused look. Then Arwen shrugged, Aragorn smiled, and the happy couple leaned in to share a polite kiss.

THE END


End file.
